Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), previously running to be the nominee of the Democratic Party for president of the United States, finalized the purchase of the Cornell School of Industrial and Labor Relations — which he plans to rename the School of Industrial and Labor Revolution — on Monday.
Commenting upon the unprecedented sale, Sanders himself said the following: “It is a perfect way to spread our message other than being nominated for the presidency — and besides, now I have a way to spend the rest of our received campaign contributions.”
University President E. Martha Pollack expressed excitement over the prospect of an ILR makeover.
“As soon as Senator Sanders approached us with the idea to purchase and rename the ILR School, we knew it was the perfect opportunity to usher in a new era for ILR and Cornell as a whole,” Pollack said. “Hopefully, people will now be more distracted so we can implement the School for Public Policy without protest.”
Though no additional details have been released other than the school’s new name, it is widely believed that Sen. Sanders himself will arrive at Cornell next week via Greyhound bus to tour the ILR campus.
Some students were thrilled with the senator’s latest purchase.
“I’ve been waiting for this moment for my entire life,” said ILR student Bernard “Blanco” Stuart Avior ’21. “I have posters of Karl Marx and Antonio Gramsci hanging on my bedroom wall, and a copy of the Communist Manifesto in my pocket that I always carry with me.”
Still, not every student felt as enthusiastic.
“Frankly, I think Bernie’s just trying to find a way to be President of something and recruit students to a Socialist agenda at the same time,” said Amanda Keisenug ’22. Before any follow-up questions could be asked, she handed The Sun a “Taxation is Theft” sticker and walked away.
And of course, the pranksters and hooligans of Cornell turned out in droves, shamelessly blasting the Soviet national anthem from their windows, laughing and downing seemingly-infinite shots of vodka. These students, collectively known as the “Meme Contingent,” promised to support Sanders in every way possible — “with 4chan and Reddit on our side, we won’t switch off our keyboards and MS Paint applications until Bernie’s labor revolution is realized,” Pepe LeFrog ’20 told The Sun. The Soviet-inspired celebration surged on, unaffected by the enforced quarantine guidelines.
At this moment, more concrete guidelines and specifications for the upcoming revolution have not been made public; one thing for sure, however, is that it will not be televised.
“If we have to do this remotely, we’re going back to the good old days,” Sanders said. “All classes shall be conducted via carrier pigeon.”
This piece is part of The Sun’s April 20 joke issue series. For more, visit https://cornellsun.com/category/four-twenty/.